Dear Sarah - 002

Flexing our drawing muscles (tea eggs and silver birds)

Dear Sarah - 002

(Just joining us? These letters chronicle our full year of daily drawings and accompanying correspondence/conversation. Learn more about Sarah Harvey here. More info about me can be found here.)

Note: Though I am now physically in Tokyo and not rooting around in my kitchen, I wasn’t sure how much time I’d have here (or how jet-lagged I’d be), I preemptively wrote a couple of emergency posts before leaving the country. As of tomorrow, though, I will have caught up with myself more or less… Also disconcerting is the fact I’m already well into 2025 as we are a full day ahead of North America, so my Jan 1 start on Sarah’s yesterday was a tad premature.

Casting around in the kitchen (I'm working at the kitchen table rather than in my office so as to be a bit more sociable over Christmas) for something that once belonged to Dad (in response to your mother's purse of yesterday) I found this tea egg in the cutlery drawer. I think it was actually my grandmother's, which is how it came into Dad's possession and, subsequently, mine. I doubt Dad ever used it. His hot beverage of choice was instant coffee - with two small spoonfuls of sugar and lots of milk. While out of politeness he may have deigned to sip tea to appease British relatives, he wouldn't have been caught dead drinking what I'm drinking as I write this. INGREDIENTS: Apple pieces, Hibiscus petals, Rosehip, Elderberry, Cranberry pieces, Natural flavours (Organic compliant).

Last night I had a mugful sweetened with honey. As I type this, I realize I should have stuck to that formula as the milk I added this evening seems to have performed some variation on a curdle and sunk to the bottom of the mug. I've never had a tea experience quite like this. Previous tea curdlings resulted in flecks and lumps floating to the top. As it is, if I sip carefully I can avoid the sludge and debris collecting at the bottom of the mug.

Note on the drawing: It was shockingly hard to get the proportions even close to correct on this plump sucker. It's still too elongated but I'm tired and don't want to start yet again. Even though erasing is dead easy with the iPad, I still have to redraw to get it right(er).

Dear Nikki - 002

I've had this silver bird for a long time. It was a Christmas decoration that stayed on the shelf long after all the other decorations were put away. It shares a shelf with a black metal crow, a sweet ceramic mother bird and her two nestlings, and a pair of colourful folk art roosters. A shelf below, the Little Prince, Babar and a Power Ranger seem unaware of the aviary above them.

I'm not a birdwatcher, except in a casual "Is that a crow or a raven?" way, nor do I think I ever will be, although I do have an excellent app called Merlin on my phone that identifies birds by their song. Will I ever paint birds from nature? I don't know. Anything is possible. I did identify a junco in the wild recently...